MUCORALES 



263 



appreciable enlargement of the primary stalk at the point of 

 origin of the conidia-bearing branches. 



Gandrup (1923) mentions a new species, Choanephora dichot- 

 oma, but does not describe it. 



3. Cunninghamella Matruchot (Saccardo Syll. Fung., 6: 508, 



1905; nom. nud. Ann. Mycol., 1: 46, 1903). 



syn. Adinocephalum Saito (Bot. Mag. Tokyo, 19: 1, 1904). 

 Sporangia never observed in the genus, though perhaps 

 occasionally developed under special conditions of environment 

 (Thaxter, 1914: 358); asexual reproduction, as far as known, 

 taking place exclusively by means of conidia (Fig. 94); conidio- 

 phores arising from the vegetative hyphae, erect, more or less 

 branched, sometimes septate; each 

 branch terminated in a capitate 

 vesicle covered with sterigmata bear- 

 ing small, spiny, unicellular, globose 

 to oval or pyriform, deciduous con- 

 idia; the type of branching differing 

 in the various species; in C. elegans 

 a main stalk bearing a subterminal 

 whorl of branches each of which is 

 apically swollen; in C. echimdata the 

 branching cymose to indefinite; glo- 

 bose chlamydospores intercalary in 

 the mycelium; the known species 

 heterothallic ; gametangia approxi- 

 mately equal; zygospore rough but 

 not appendaged. 



The type species of the genus was 

 originally described by Thaxter (1891 : 

 17) as Oedocephalum echinulatuni. 

 Its inclusion in this hyphomycetous 

 genus was questioned by Matruchot 

 (1903:46) inasmuch as its hyphae are conidiophore. {After Thaxter 



, „ 1891.) 



characteristically coenocytic, and in 



an interesting experiment he demonstrated that it will serve 

 as a host for the species of Piptocephalis which parasitize 

 Mucorales exclusively. He established the genus Cunning- 

 hamella for its inclusion and renamed the species C. africana. 

 Though he failed to give a generic description, this was later 



Fig. 9 4. — Cunninghamella 

 echinulata Thaxter. Showing 

 echinulate conidia covering 

 capitate terminations of the 



